Welcome to a Nightmare

Chapter 9: Start the Spark

Henry could not believe his eyes. It's Violet Morgan... the daughter of Sir Morgan, one of King Arthur's Knights of the Round Table and his girlfriend. A girl he had fallen in love with and had been dating up until everything went to hell. Now it seems that she doesn't recognize him at all and become the darkest version of herself. Wipe away the scowl, attitude, and overall darkness and edginess of her appearance and you'd have the sweet, happy, and loving Violet.

She blows smoke out of her mouth and glares at the kid who is supposed to be her boyfriend.

"How do you know my name?" she snaps. Her voice sounded cold, emotionless, and gruff, most likely because of the smoking.

"It's me, Henry, don't you remember?" he asks.

"If I did remember someone named Henry, I'd tell the moron that my name is Vee, not Violet."

"Vee?" Henry says in confusion. "You mean like the letter V?"

"You got a problem with my name?!" she barks. She squashes the cigarette under her combat boot and steps forward with her hands raised, she's about to collar him.

The young author immediately steps back, not wanting to be thrown up against another wall in less than a few hours.

"N-No... it's just... you always liked Violet as a name, it's really pretty..."

"Pretty?" she says flatly. "Buddy, I'm far from pretty."

Henry is hurt, deeply hurt that Violet doesn't remember who he is. She's the first girl he'd ever kissed, the first girl whom he'd really made a connection with, the first person whom he trusted outside of his Storybrooke family. All those memories they shared; listening to his iPod, talking about music by the jukebox, horseback riding, watching movies together, their journey to destroy magic... everything that they've been through is gone, wiped away in the curse's puff of smoke.

"No, you're more than pretty, you're beautiful," he blurts out.

Violet's brown eyes lock with his hazel ones. For a very brief second, he thinks he can see her blush at the compliment; her hardened personae softens and for just a split second, the real Violet shines through again. She gives him a raised eyebrow and a small smirk. She then goes into her black backpack and lights herself another cigarette.

The young author wants desperately to convince Violet of who she really was; that she was the daughter of a knight from King Arthur's court, they rode horses together, she once had her heart stolen by his Dark One mother to break his own heart, she was swept up in a curse that brought her to the modern world, she journeyed with him to New York City to try and destroy magic and magically helped him bring his family back to him by using a wishing well. He wants to say all of this, but like his mom, like his grandfather, like Archie and no doubt, everyone else who once lived in Storybrooke would never believe him. He knows he can't be preaching his beliefs again, it would isolate him, and no one would help break this curse. He knew that if he said this, she'd just call him crazy or a freak and runoff. He needs someone, anyone that he can be close to, even if they cannot remember him.

"Maybe on the outside, but on the inside, I've got some damage," she shrugs. She does a long drag of her cigarette and tries to go back to minding her own business, but Henry keeps staring at her. "Are you some kind of stalker or whatever?" she asks bluntly, letting some smoke blow into his face.

"N-No, why do you say that?"

"Because you keep on staring at me and you followed me through the hole in the wall."

"I was really only trying to investigate why you were going into the boys' bathroom," he says in an almost equally blunt voice.

"Well now you know," she mutters sarcastically. "It's the only place anyone could get some peace and quiet, a place to escape until you showed up that is."